Student Soldiers

Rotc Cadets Hear Praise For Troops In Iraq, Protests Against War

April 21, 2003|By JOHN JURGENSEN; Courant Staff Writer

Most days, it would be difficult to identify the soldiers enrolled at the University of Connecticut. Their clipped haircuts blend in on this athletic campus. And they complete their morning exercises hours before most students open their eyes. Only one day a week do the members of the Army Reserve Officers' Training Corps don their uniforms.

Doing so gets them noticed, especially at a time when American forces are emerging from war to face an indefinite occupation of Iraq. Though there's some controversy about the conflict, ROTC students have become beneficiaries of local support for the military men and women deployed.

On a hot Tuesday afternoon last week, lots of skin was showing on the UConn campus. Cutting through a bright river of shorts, tank tops and skirts, cadet Christopher Ruel made his way to anthropology class in full camouflage and combat boots. Grousing amiably about the heat, he nodded, waved and shouted greetings to friendly faces as he went. The occasional sidelong looks he got probably had less to do with the message his uniform sent than how unfit it was for the temperature.

Three decades ago, such a walk would have been tense for a cadet, possibly dangerous. During the Vietnam War, a military uniform on campus was an explosive symbol.

The first time, about 1,500 anti-war protesters occupied the concrete hangar for 24 hours as they tried to remodel it into a free day-care center. Students used 36 gallons of paint to decorate every surface with flowers and peace signs as Army officials stood guard over their offices.

It was May 1970. Students at UConn and across the nation were on strike.

``Military people kill children,'' one student said to an officer, The Courant reported. ``So either leave or take off your uniforms.''

Destruction marked the second encroachment, seven months later. Just as the fall semester ended, somebody firebombed the hangar. Gas-filled bottles pitched through a rear window scorched three ROTC offices. Authorities suspected anti-war activists but made no arrests.

The university demolished the ROTC hangar five years ago. Yellow ribbons flutter on trees and lamp posts near the ROTC's new home, a reconfigured brick dormitory across from the library. On the third floor, where posters advertise duty, honor and loyalty, cadets train to become Army officers. (The Air Force ROTC, with about 60 members from Connecticut and Rhode Island, has its headquarters on the fourth floor).

On a recent Tuesday, two cadets checked the latest footage from Iraq on CNN but soon turned the television off. There was a weekend exercise to plan.

``If it ain't raining, we ain't training,'' said Corrie VanDyke.

``Hooah!'' grunted the cadets, using the all-purpose military affirmative.

After the briefing, the cadets, most of whom already belong to the National Guard, talked pragmatically about the potential for their own deployment, to Iraq or elsewhere.

``What we're doing over there hasn't changed the job we signed up for. I just hope I can do it as a professional,'' said Ruel, 22, a senior.

``There have always been those kind of outbreaks, like Bosnia or Haiti. Joining the military without thinking anything was going to happen would be ignorant,'' said Giancarlo Diangeli, another senior.

About 300 freshmen and sophomores from colleges around the state take ``military science'' classes at UConn and Sacred Heart University in Fairfield. These can be electives, requiring no formal commitment to the Army. If the students qualify for a scholarship, based on grades and fitness, they may earn full tuition and a monthly stipend. (ROTC members in the National Guard can make more than $1,000 a month on top of their tuition.) Currently, more than 30 juniors and seniors have signed contracts to go on active or reserve duty after graduation.

But until they do, they stay on the sidelines of military action.

Watching coverage of the war has been frustrating at times, Ruel said. ``It's not like an itch, like, `Oh, I can't wait to go.' But you just feel like you should be there. It's your job to be there, but you can't yet. You want that opportunity to prove yourself or to do what you know you can do.''

At UConn, Army ROTC membership has remained fairly steady in recent years. Nationwide, enrollment has risen by about 2,000 in the last two years, to nearly 31,000 students on more than 270 campuses.The outbreak of war, just like the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 before it, made students take a new look at an old institution in their midst. Recruiting officer Colby said his volume of phone calls, from supporters and prospective recruits, tripled after Sept. 11, 2001.